"Just keep swimming"

I lost my job today. Well by the time I publish this it will be yesterday. Semantics. It's 2am (now) and I have to be up at 6:30 am to go workout with my trainer. I should sleep...but I can't. Instead I keep replaying the events of the last 3 days in my mind. I think about what I could have said or done to avoid this feeling of emptiness... of failure... from creeping up in my stomach. Again. So far, I can't think of anything and I have been mulling it over for about 8 hours now. Words are like therapy for me, so take a load off and sit a spell...I got a story to tell.

That bullshit

 I felt great as I walked in for my shift today. I even sang my prayers in the shower. I was sure that this Wednesday would be different than last Wednesday (when I walked out with $12). I resigned that my positive energy would somehow bring me a different outcome. I guess I was right. I noticed right off that I wasn't on the floor plan for a section, but that has happened before so I wasn't worried. Honestly, part of me was hoping that my manager would let me leave early so I could go to Zuumba. Ten minutes later when I was ushered into the office with two managers and the co owner...all of them male...but none of them man enough to look me in the eye, I realized I was being let go. The manager rattled off some rhetoric about how "much he liked me as a person" and how "this type of thing is never easy," and how he thinks, "this isn't a good fit for me."  I'm silent until he finishes. In my mind, I think about this past Sunday when I had 3 parties with more than 8 people and I am asked to wait on the owner. I am tired and way too busy to take care of the owner but I do...because I don't know how to say no to the owner.  I am sweaty and shaking by the time I get to his table, as I result I have a hard time opening his bottle of wine. Impatient, he takes it from me and opens it. I know this is bad... but the innocence in me wants to think he will use this as a teachable moment instead of ammunition. After it's over, I apologize profusely and am told by him and THREE other people that this is nothing to worry about. I am even given a $40 tip from the owner. I hope it's over...but I guess deep down I know it's not. So that's why I don't cry after it happens. I tell my side of the story...knowing it won't help me but I hope it at least gives the cowards I work for a lesson in both humility and integrity.

I mention that I have texted the manager multiple times since Sunday asking if someone can work one on one with me to insure that what happened Sunday wont happen again. I mention that no one has responded. The males still look at thier feet. I walk out. I call my half-wife, praying she can't feel my shame through the phone. I cry after we have hung up. I still go to Zuumba. And then I wait. I wait to feel something other than numb emptiness. I wait for a sign that this is  a good thing or that I have not failed myself again.

Earlier this evening, I tweeted that I just wanted to quit. Almost immediately one of my fireworks tweeted me that quitting wasn't an option. I laugh a little in my head...because ironically quitting isn't an option for someone who keeps getting fired. blah. I guess I am not sad just a little angry. I am not sad because this is a pattern for me. Whenever I have made any major changes in my life spiritually something drastic happens in my physically. Would you believe that I have been fired 5 times in the last 6 years and 4 of those times have been during a fast? I know that when I tell GOD to remove all the things and people from my life that aren't of him...he hears me. I know this is for the best somehow. But it still hurts. It hurts to be rejected and let go. Especially when it has happened so frequently and when you think you are doing what you are supposed to avoid it. It's already hard enough for me to humble myself enough to submit to someone who had less education and less experience than me. It's already hard to give up all my weekends and holidays. Or to have no health insurance or to be at the mercy of every X list celebrity in the A...but then to be told you aren't even good enough for that...it's a punch in the gut!

Under the Radar

My half-wife says that as sad as it is, people get further when they fly "under the radar." You know just do their job quietly...don't ruffle any feathers. Well guess who sucks at that? When she is telling me this, I think back to last Friday (2 days before I committed the immortal sin of being nervous and unable to open a bottle of wine).  Last Friday, I called a meeting with my manager. In it, I expressed that I was disappointed because I was hired to be a cocktail waitress and then forced to be a server. I complained about the three days of unpaid training. I expressed concern that we did not get our paychecks on time.  I told him I was worried that I have made less than $20 more than once...more than twice. I thought our meeting was proactive and mature. I thought he would respect me  for being honest and not directing my negativity toward the guests. Key word...thought.

I can recall a similar pattern at all the other jobs I have lost.  At the American Cancer Society, I scheduled a meeting with the Chief Operating Officer to discuss why more money wasn't devoted to lung cancer (the number one cancer killer) and cervical cancer (the ONLY preventable cancer), I was told that all the money was in breast cancer and that it would remain a priority until funding for other cancers increased. Plus, another coworker added, if they cured cancer none of us would have a job.

 I was fired for insubordination the next week. 

At the Boy Scouts, when I refused to sign forged documents, I was pressured. When I wouldn't lie to poor inner city kids, I was intimidated. When they found out I was gay, I was let go.

 So I guess, I am bad at flying under the radar. Now what?

"I don't do it for my health..."

 I suppose my quest for being an author has kind of the same sentiment. I am not like the other authors who are vying for this contract. I am not over 40. I do not have a Ph D. I am not a white woman with a soft voice (as my half-wife calls the other contenders). I am just a regular person who thinks her honesty and can help other people. I am a good listener. And arguably a good writer/story teller. There is only one problem with that. It's not good enough. Being good is not good enough anymore. You have to be great. Which is more as one of my fireworks reminded me yesterday you have to have good people around, underneath, behind and in front of you.

A lot of people have told me that they like this blog because of my honesty...so here is some good old fashioned truth.

I have been fired from almost every job I have ever had in Atlanta. Maybe its because I ruffle to many feathers, or because I am not Christian, or because I'm gay, or don't smile enough at the right people. maybe it's because I am a big ole nonconformist bitch. I don't know and at this point, I am too anesthetized to care. What I do care about is this contest. Why? Because it's the only thing I have ever done that has felt right and good. But even in the midst of all this I know that if I don't have enough people who follow this blog or my Twitter page or Facebook page it could all be for naught. I hate to say it but this is a numbers game in a lot of ways. More than that nowadays you have to prove yourself first. So I need you, bad. Right now, I have 58 people who have joined this blog, yet the blog has over 6,000 hits. Why aren't the people who are reading... following?  I know what it's like to feel like your one voice doesn't matter...but it does. Majorly. I need every person who reads or watches to join or follow. 

 I have known a lot of disappointment and pain in my life and each time I have tried to pick myself up and keep moving...even if its slow. Sometimes I don't know where it comes from but lately I know that part of it comes from you guys. Thinking about my fireworks is what compelled me to go to Zuumba after I have been crying for 20 minutes. I couldn't give up as much as I wanted to. And emotionally, I don't want to give up on this...but I have to be honest...I am tired ya'll and drained. Some days this book and my half wife's smile is the only thing that makes me feel like I make a difference in this world. So I have to do all I can to make this a reality for me. Nothing else has worked. Now this is not to say that if the book thing doesn't work out I am going to jump off the curb or swallow a bottle of completely harmless Flintstone's vitamins, but I will be sad if I don't put my best foot forward. I pray that you will do what you can too. If you read something you like, tell someone else... retweet it. Facebook it. 

 I went on a Twitter rampage last night because I heard about that Amber Cole video. I was furious that so many people were trying to watch a video of a child committing a sex act. First off, it's a little vile and pedophile-esque that grownups want to watch the video. But secondly people...young people have sex all the time. And they are going to continue to do so until the adults in the world provide a better example for them to follow. Until then, can any of us fault this baby for being mislead and having low self esteem. How much stupid embarrassing nasty shit have you done when you were in a bad place? Right...so stop it. On the other hand, how many young people do you mentor? Do you make an effort to show young people a more positive way to live? Or do you just sit in your glass house and throw electronic stones. Plus, I know that this video isn't about that girl anyway. We would have been just as happy to watch a negative video about anybody. We just like to know someone's life sucks more than ours.  I got angry because, I am so tired of young people being consumed with such bs like sex tapes and gossip. I think we are more than that. But they (the politicians, law makers, and powers that be) don't. I want to prove that this generation is not as careless and lost as we appear.

"I do it for the belt..."

So I am going to make you some promises.... in roughly 3 hours I am going to get up and go workout. I am going to continue my #30daythankyou. I am going to resist the urge to leak all the personal information that I know about my former boss and his restaurant. I am going to take the high road. I am going to pray and mediate and be great.ful for what I do have. As much as I want to curl up in a ball, cry, and collect unemployment.  I am going to get another job. I am going to try. Now in exchange for all that...will you tell your friends and loved ones about the S p a c e & Silence community? Will you participate in #30daythankyou, and bring a smile to someone who may be feeling underappreciated like me? Will you try to?

The president of Hay House's name is Reid Tracy. He has a Facebook page, you can't post on it... but you CAN send him notes on Twitter (http://twitter.com/#!/reidtracy). Maybe can we all tweet him notes in support of my proposal? Maybe we can tag him in our #30daythankyou notes? I think I am going to do that.  My whole life, I have been getting noticed for all the wrong reasons help me make it the right ones.

I promise not to quit...but I need your help to remember why not....

Thanks in advance.

-"Fire" (d)